From an average user's perspective, the existing evaluation system is completely unable to distinguish between high-quality models, ordinary models, and even garbage models.

From a professional designer's standpoint, it’s difficult for me to tell which models are printable and which are covered in flaws before opening slicing software! I’ve always felt helpless about this situation—because the evaluation system itself is an extremely complex framework, and achieving perfection is impossible; it’s a worldwide challenge. However, in some respects, we can still sort out simple threads within this intricate system!

First of all, in the field of industrial design, the evaluation criteria for a product generally fall into three main categories: innovation, user experience, and aesthetic design. For example, international competitions like Red Dot, iF, and IDEA all adopt similar evaluation systems. But this set of criteria is not suitable for average users, because only designers can identify core design issues—ordinary users can only roughly judge design complexity. The same goes for innovation: a "novel and exotic" work in the eyes of ordinary users may just be a simple copy of existing products, or even a poorly reproduced one, yet ordinary users still give it extremely high ratings. In a designer’s eyes, however, it’s just a garbage work! Therefore, the ultimate evaluation system must be based on user experience while comprehensively considering innovation and aesthetic design.

First, what can users intuitively perceive? It’s the ease of assembly, structural integrity, functional usability of the finished product, and of course, aesthetic design.

By quantifying these four aspects specifically for 3D printing, we derive four core indicators: Design Effect, Practicality, Assembly Experience, and Surface Texture. Each indicator is divided into 5 levels with a score range of 1-5 points; innovation and aesthetic design serve as bonus items.

Evaluation System

• S+ Grade (Exceptional Level): Models with perfect performance in Design Effect, Practicality, Assembly Experience, and Surface Texture! Such models are comparable to commercial products, meeting or approaching direct commercialization standards!
• S Grade (High-Quality Level): A level achievable by most creators willing to invest time in refinement. No single indicator scores below 4 points (e.g., the model surface has extremely minor flaws or the design has subtle, negligible defects). This level is highly inclusive, encompassing all models that users consider "relatively good"!
• A Grade (Qualified Level): A fully qualified work with no single indicator scoring below 3 points. This is the basic quality that all works should possess, and it is widely applicable to most models.
• B Grade (Substandard Level): Works that require improvement and optimization, mostly created by novice modelers or 3D printing beginners. One of the four indicators scores only 2 points. This category is intended to encourage beginners or distinguish models with obvious inherent design flaws from the start!
• C Grade (Garbage Level): As a manufacturing process, 3D printing inherently has certain limitations—just like traditional injection molding cannot produce one-piece products, not all works are suitable for 3D printing. Models that are completely unsuitable for 3D printing, a large number of low-quality "filler" works (including many AI-generated models unfit for printing), fall into this category. One or more of the four indicators scores only 1 point or even 0 points!

Innovation and aesthetic design exist as bonus items: outstanding innovative works will naturally receive higher overall ratings from users. However, in a community flooded with 5-star ratings, simple star-based evaluations have lost their reference value!

The ideal evaluation system should be dynamic, providing users with sufficient room for improvement. For example, new models could feature a "delayed display of evaluation levels," and recent reviews could be given higher weight. The ultimate goal is to build an efficient and feasible healthy ecosystem that fully motivates creators to produce high-quality works.

I will first apply this plan to my studio’s model displays, and I hope more creators will join in to jointly maintain a positive creative environment!

Finally, here’s a wish for the platform: Change is always painful, but only a high-quality ecosystem can nurture a high-quality community. Please upgrade the evaluation system as soon as possible—this outdated rating system derived from online merchandise is simply unsuitable for evaluating creative content!